The Art of Showing Up
Sovereignty, Sweat, and the Discipline to Stay
Post Illusion Press Vol. 2
The Rock and the Rebellion: Sisyphus and the Logic of Endurance
Part 1 of a three-essay series on existential sovereignty
Abstract
Albert Camus’s Myth of Sisyphus (1942/1955) has long served as a touch-stone for discussions of absurdity and revolt, yet its deeper resonance with the lived practices of disciplined, repetitive effort—most visibly endurance sport—remains under-examined. This essay offers a systematic reading of Sisyphus as an archetype of existential sovereignty: an agent who converts compulsory repetition into chosen meaning through lucid awareness. Drawing on Camus, Thomas Nagel, and recent philosophy-of-sport scholarship, the paper situates Sisyphus within a broader logic of cyclical effort, arguing that the myth supplies a conceptual grammar for understanding any practice in which individuals willingly embrace unending labour to cultivate autonomy. The essay establishes the theoretical ground for a forthcoming analysis of the Unicorn Tapestries and, in a third installment, a synthesis of both myths as complementary models of stillness and struggle.
Keywords: Camus, absurd, endurance sport, repetition, sovereignty, existentialism
1 Introduction: Repetition as Problem and Promise
The boulder that eternally descends before Sisyphus’s eyes dramatizes a human dilemma older than Greek myth: What do repetitive actions mean when they lead nowhere? Camus (1955) recasts that dilemma as the central insight of the absurd, the fracture between our craving for significance and a cosmos that offers none. Modern life, with its treadmill of labour, training, and data loops, often renders the myth uncannily literal (Nagel, 1971). Yet the same loop can become an arena for self-definition. This essay asks:
How does the Sisyphus figure illuminate the logic by which disciplined repetition—particularly in endurance contexts—transforms external compulsion into interior freedom?
By answering, we lay a conceptual foundation for two companion essays: one on the Unicorn in Captivity tapestry (c. 1495–1505) and a synthesis exploring sovereignty between stillness and struggle.
2 Camus’s Sisyphus: From Condemnation to Conscious Revolt
Camus frames Sisyphus as the “absurd hero” precisely because he knows the futility of his task and yet persists (Camus, 1955, p. 123). Three moves are central:
Recognition – Sisyphus grasps the full extent of his condition; the gods can punish his body but not deceive his mind.
Refusal of Resignation – Awareness does not become despair; it becomes a “permanent consciousness”(Camus, 1955, p. 120).
Creative Reversal – Through that consciousness, pushing the rock becomes his activity, not the gods’. Lucidity transfigures punishment into self-willed action.
Critics have questioned whether Camus overstates Sisyphus’s agency (e.g., Aronson, 2017), yet the core insight stands: meaning can emerge entirely from the stance one takes toward necessity. Camus thus offers a model of sovereignty that is neither escape nor nihilistic collapse.
3 Endurance Sport as Applied Absurdity
3.1 Cyclic Effort Without Final Victory
Ultrarunners, rowers, swimmer-hour-counters—their events conclude, yet training quickly resumes. The victoryhorizon recedes with each new season, mirroring Sisyphus’s eternally resetting slope (Breivik, 2019). Sport philosophers note that athletes often value “ongoing striving” over finite goals (Feezell, 2013). From an absurdist lens, this preference signals an embrace of the loop as practice of self.
3.2 Lucidity and Flow
Camus’s lucidity resonates with the athlete’s kinesthetic awareness—an unmediated concentration on breath, cadence, terrain. Where Camus stresses intellectual recognition, endurance sport grounds lucidity in somaesthetic immediacy (Howe, 2020). The shared denominator is presence: body or mind squarely inside the task, disarmed of illusions of final rescue.
3.3 Sovereignty Through Self-Imposed Labor
Unlike Sisyphus, endurance athletes choose their hills. Yet once committed—to a training calendar, a mileage quota—they purposely bind themselves. Philosophers of voluntary hardship argue that such self-binding externalizes will, creating a structure against which the self exercises agency (Bannister, 2022). The athlete’s regimen, like the rock, is obstinate; mastery lies in repeated, conscious consent.
4 Toward a Philosophy of Lucid Repetition
The Sisyphus myth yields four principles useful for any domain of deliberate cycles—practice rooms, laboratories, meditation cushions:
PrincipleMythic ExpressionPractical CorollaryConstraint is givenThe gods dictate the taskThe schedule, the injury, the marketAwareness is electiveSisyphus understands his fateAthlete tracks inner dialogue, not just metricsConsent converts fatePushing becomes his laborTraining becomes self-authored ritualMeaning is processual“The struggle itself is enough” (Camus, 1955, p. 123)Value arises during, not after, exertion
These principles dismantle the common binary of freedom versus captivity. Sovereignty appears as a dynamic relation: a stance that neither denies the rock nor idolizes it but perpetually re-chooses it.
5 Conclusion: Clearing the Ground for a Wider Mythic Dialogue
By reframing Sisyphus as a template for lucid, self-binding repetition, we clarify why disciplines grounded in cyclical effort—endurance training, long-term research, sustained craftsmanship—become arenas of existential affirmation rather than futility. This reading prepares the way for Part 2, where the Unicorn in Captivity will offer a contrasting archetype: sovereignty expressed through stillness within bounds. Part 3 will synthesize the moving hill and the enclosed garden as complementary modalities of sovereign selfhood. Together, the trilogy aims to show that freedom is not the absence of constraint, but the art of choosing one’s stance within it.
References
Aronson, R. (2017). Camus and Sartre: The story of a friendship and the quarrel that ended it (Rev. ed.). University of Chicago Press.
Bannister, J. (2022). Voluntary hardship and the ethics of self-binding. Journal of Ethical Theory, 29(2), 145-168.
Breivik, G. (2019). From “philosophy of sport” to existential meaning in movement. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 46(1), 1-16.
Camus, A. (1955). The myth of Sisyphus (J. O’Brien, Trans.). Vintage. (Original work published 1942)
Feezell, R. (2013). Sport, play, and ethical reflection. University of Illinois Press.
Howe, P. D. (2020). Somaesthetics and endurance: On bodily consciousness in sport. Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, 14(4), 431-445.
Nagel, T. (1971). The absurd. The Journal of Philosophy, 68(20), 716-727.
The Captive Wild: Foundations of the Unicorn Tapestry
Part 2 of a three-essay series on existential sovereignty
We all crave freedom, but what if freedom doesn’t look like escape? What if it looks like stillness within a fence we choose?
In medieval art, the Unicorn in Captivity (c. 1495–1505) shows a powerful creature resting calmly within a small, circular enclosure. The fence is low enough that the unicorn could leave at any moment, yet it stays. For many, this image has symbolized taming, captivity, or even defeat. But what if, like Sisyphus with his rock, the unicorn’s stillness within the fence is an act of sovereignty rather than surrender?
In this essay, we explore how the Unicorn Tapestry can guide endurance athletes, artists, and anyone in a long, repetitive practice to reframe stillness as an active choice. It is a complementary model to the Sisyphus myth: where Sisyphus represents struggle in motion, the unicorn represents sovereignty in stillness.
The Unicorn’s Fence: Constraint Without Captivity
At first glance, the unicorn seems trapped. The fence encircles it, and a collar rests around its neck. In training, we often feel a similar sense of limitation: injuries, schedules, financial constraints, or the grind of repeated efforts can feel like enclosures we cannot escape.
But the fence is low, and the unicorn remains by choice. Like the athlete who keeps returning to the gym, pool, or track, the unicorn chooses to stay inside a boundary for reasons that transcend simple restriction. The fence becomes a structure within which it can rest, recover, and find focus.
Philosopher Agnes Callard describes aspiration as choosing to stay within constraints in order to become something we are not yet (Callard, 2018). The unicorn’s fence can be seen as an aspirational enclosure, creating the conditions for growth and clarity rather than captivity.
Stillness as Active Choice
Endurance athletes know that stillness is not always passive. Rest days require as much discipline as training days, and tapering before a race can feel more challenging than high-volume weeks. The unicorn’s calm within the fence mirrors the mindset needed during these phases.
Where Sisyphus represents active, lucid struggle, the unicorn embodies lucid stillness—a quiet, conscious resting in the boundaries chosen for a purpose. This is not quitting; it is the paradox of slowing down to preserve the self for the next effort.
Meditative traditions, too, speak of this paradox: sitting still, we confront the urge to flee discomfort, yet by staying, we discover a deeper agency. The unicorn, resting yet untamed, shows us that stillness can be its own form of rebellion against the constant drive to prove, perform, or escape.
Four Principles of Lucid Stillness
Building on the principles of Sisyphus’s lucid repetition, the unicorn adds:
Boundaries are chosen: The fence is not a prison but a frame for growth.
Stillness requires discipline: Resting is a practice, not an absence of effort.
Presence reveals sovereignty: By staying within the fence, the unicorn demonstrates control, not submission.
Recovery is preparation: Stillness becomes the ground for future action, not its negation.
For athletes, this can mean respecting recovery and taper, embracing focused rest, and using constraints (time, injury, environment) as frameworks for thoughtful training rather than frustrations.
Preparing for the Synthesis
Together with Sisyphus’s lesson on struggle, the unicorn’s lesson on stillness completes the picture of existential sovereignty. Sovereignty is not found in constant motion alone, nor in indefinite retreat, but in the lucid choice to engage with boundaries—whether that means pushing the rock or choosing the fence.
In Part 3, we will bring these images together to explore how moving hills and enclosed gardens can guide us in crafting a life of chosen meaning, whether in training, creative practice, or the day-to-day efforts of becoming ourselves.
Sources
Callard, A. (2018). Aspiration: The agency of becoming. Oxford University Press.
Camus, A. (1955). The myth of Sisyphus (J. O’Brien, Trans.). Vintage. (Original work published 1942)
The Unicorn Tapestries. (n.d.). The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved from https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/467642
The Fence and the Hill: Sovereignty Between Stillness and Struggle
Part 3 of a three-essay series on existential sovereignty
What does it mean to live freely within limits? What does it mean to keep moving forward even when the summit never arrives? Sisyphus and the unicorn give us two models of existential sovereignty: one in motion, the other in stillness. But most of life, and certainly endurance sport, demands we learn how to hold both.
This final essay in our series weaves together the lessons of the rock and the fence to explore how sovereignty is not about avoiding struggle or seeking constant movement, but about the lucid art of choosing how we relate to the constraints we face.
The Hill: Choosing the Struggle
We saw in Sisyphus a model of lucid repetition: returning to the hill with open eyes, accepting that the work is unending, and finding freedom in the act of choosing the struggle daily. For endurance athletes, this means embracing training cycles, understanding setbacks as part of the path, and recognizing that value comes from process, not just finish lines.
Each workout, each season, each year becomes another push of the rock, not in futility, but as an act of self-authored meaning.
The Fence: Choosing Stillness
In the Unicorn in Captivity, we found a model of lucid stillness: the unicorn remains within the fence by choice, demonstrating that sovereignty is not simply motion, but the conscious practice of staying within boundaries for recovery, reflection, and preparation.
For athletes, this is the discipline of tapering, rest, and respecting constraints such as injury or life obligations while maintaining presence and intentionality.
Sovereignty as Dynamic Balance
Most of us live in the tension between the hill and the fence. We crave the drive of forward motion but often resist the need to pause. We want the clarity of stillness but fear stagnation.
True sovereignty is not found in rejecting one for the other but in learning when to push the rock and when to sit within the fence. It is an active, ongoing negotiation with our reality, a commitment to meet each day’s conditions with presence and choice.
The philosopher Albert Camus (1955) reminds us that "the struggle itself is enough to fill a man’s heart," while the Unicorn Tapestry shows us that quiet moments within constraints can be equally sovereign.
Four Practices for Athletes Seeking Sovereignty
Bringing these myths together, athletes (and anyone engaged in repetitive, growth-oriented practices) can consider these principles:
Return with Lucidity: Keep showing up to your chosen work, eyes open to the reality of repetition.
Rest with Intention: Choose stillness when it is time, understanding that it is not weakness but preparation.
Reframe Constraints: See limits (time, injury, conditions) as frameworks for agency rather than prisons.
Define Success as Presence: Value the moments of practice, not only the medals or finish lines.
In this synthesis, sovereignty becomes a daily stance rather than a final achievement.
Conclusion: Living Between the Fence and the Hill
As you continue in your training, creative pursuits, or personal growth, remember that freedom is not the absence of effort or constraint. It is the ability to choose your relationship to the hill you climb and the fence within which you rest.
Whether you are returning to a training cycle, recovering from injury, or reflecting on your direction, the combined wisdom of Sisyphus and the unicorn can guide you toward a life of chosen meaning, even in repetition.
May your rock and your fence both become grounds for sovereignty.
Sources
Camus, A. (1955). The myth of Sisyphus (J. O’Brien, Trans.). Vintage. (Original work published 1942)
Callard, A. (2018). Aspiration: The agency of becoming. Oxford University Press.
The Unicorn Tapestries. (n.d.). The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved from https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/467642
If you have found this trilogy helpful, consider reflecting on which season you are in: the hill or the fence. In both, you can choose presence, and in that choice, you claim your sovereignty.